In honor of spooky season I will be exploring the Exorcist franchise. The 1973 original is a classic horror movie I had never seen until this year. Actually, I’d seen bits and pieces, specifically the infamous scene of the possession in Regan’s bedroom. That is part of the reason I avoided seeing the film for so long. As I’ve detailed before, I was not a fan of horror movies when I was younger, but even when I got into horror I avoided the demonic possession subgenre, perhaps because I found it particularly horrific. Demons seemed more realistic than zombies or vampires, and—if real—being possessed by an evil entity is probably the most terrifying horror scenario of all. Demonic possession movies could even be a case of “hyperstition”—or a piece of fiction that becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy and manifests itself in reality. Demons like those depicted in The Exorcist may not have existed before, but after the popularity of the movie, they surely exist now—at least in the imaginations of the viewers. I also avoided The Exorcist because there have been so many copycats over the years, vastly inferior retreads that further pushed me away from the possession subgenre as a whole. Plus with all the parodies and references that have permeated pop culture, I felt like I had already seen the movie. But because The Exorcist is so highly rated, and I am a horror fan, I finally saw the film in full for the first time this year, and I can confirm it is more than worthy of its high praise.